Summer Solstice 2025
In case you weren’t aware, the Summer Solstice in the Northern hemisphere took place this morning Saturday June 21, 2025 at 02:42 UTC (03:42am local Irish Time). Among other things, this means that today is the longest day of the year (as defined by the interval between sunrise and sunset).
According to this website, the interval between sunrise and sunset in Dublin today will be 17 hours and 12 seconds. which is a whole second longer than yesterday (!) and six seconds longer than tomorrow.
In the Northern hemisphere, days will get shorter from the Summer Solstice until the Winter Solstice in December.
The nights are drawing in. Although sunset does carry on getting a bit later for a few days, the days definitely start getting shorter from now on. I explained this in earlier posts here.
Incidentally, the word for “solstice” in the Irish language is grianstad which translates literally as “sun-stop”. The Summer Solstice is Grianstad an tSamhraidh“. The nominative singular word for “Summer”, a masculine noun in Irish, is Samhradh, but in the construction used here, “of summer”, it is in the genitive case so becomes Samhraidh. Moreover, when a masculine noun beginning with s- in the singular genitive is preceded by the definite article an) it experiences an initial mutation in the form of a t-prothesis; hence (an tSamraidh is “of the Summer”.
The Winter Solstice is Grianstad an Gheimhridh. The word for winter is Geimhreadh, which is masculine, and has a genitive form Geimhridh. In this case, however, because it doesn’t begin with “S” there is no t-prothesis but instead a lenition (séimhiú) that softens the initial “G” indicated by the “h”. Hence Grianstad an Gheimhridh, “Sun-stop of the Winter”.
I hope this clarifies the situation.
In the Dark 
June 21, 2025 at 3:15 pm
Perhaps too obvious to bother pointing out to your erudite readership, but the Latin origin of “solstice” also means “sun stop”. The “sol” part is easy to spot. The other part is from the verb “sistere”, which I confess I don’t remember from my long-ago school days.
June 21, 2025 at 3:23 pm
I think “sistere” can be translated as “to stand”. It’s perhaps best known in English via the Latin verb “intersistere” (to stand between) which is the origin of the English “interstice”.
June 21, 2025 at 4:50 pm
The dictionaries I have access to at the moment seem to agree on “cause to stand”, “stop, check”, “set up”. It’s also the root of “insist ”, “persist”, “resist”, “consist”.
June 21, 2025 at 5:44 pm
It’s interesting how it seems to have been absorbed into English only with a prefix!